Take The Pill
by Rainpath
Summary: Late night chat between Claudia and Myka. Started as a one-shot, but I may continue for a couple more chapters.


**Hey everyone, I'm back for a one-shot (maybe? I'm not sure if I want to continue it or not). My mental health is really just shitty right now, and what do I do instead of coping with my problems? Focus on fictional characters' problems, that's what.**

_Take the pill that makes you weaker_

_Take the pill that makes you sick_

_Take the pill, or you'll be sorry_

_Take this bloody pill, and make it quick_

_Take the pill that kills your sex drive_

_Take the pill that makes you cry_

_Take the pill that burns your insides_

_Take the pill that makes you want to die_

_Be careful what you say_

_Today could be your day_

-"Take The Pill" by Emilie Autumn (_Fight Like A Girl_, 2012)

Claudia Donovan doesn't think there is anything worse than having to doubt your own sanity.

It was past midnight, and Claudia was in her room, lying in bed, trying to sleep. But no, not tonight. Sleep was not something that seemed to be happening. Pete and Myka still weren't home from a particularly risky mission, and on nights like this, Claudia was terrified. The Warehouse was the only place she had ever felt like she belonged, and that in no small way was due to the people that had become her family. The people that made her feel less alone in a society that made absolutely sure she would never be a part of.

Artie, Pete, and Myka kept her alive, in more ways than one. Worrying about them drove her crazy, and made her think about things she'd rather forget. Her parents. Her brother's disappearance. The foster homes—tired moms and leering dads and the children people forgot. The psychiatric hospital.

Dr. Mitchner's voice telling her, over and over, that her brother was dead, wasn't enough. No, she has to remember, on these particularly bad nights, the feeling of absolute helplessness. The helplessness that came because she kept seeing Joshua and she couldn't get rid of the delusions. She could see him in everything she did, medication after medication. Risperdal. Zyprexa. Seroquel. Nothing could make him go away, to leave her eyes and live on in her heart alone.

And when she tried to leave, on her own terms, because she knew—she _knew _she didn't belong there? Tackled by security. Apparently, it takes two burly men grabbing and throwing a tiny 18-year-old girl around in order to prevent her from leaving what was supposed to be a safe place but turned out to be a stifling prison.

She learned pretty quickly after that that no one got out of there without a lying a little.

So she did. She waited until Dr. Mitchner had started her on a new drug. She claimed that she didn't see Joshua anymore. She was calm and compliant, just as a girl should be. She participated in group therapy, and told her therapist just what he wanted to hear. She was cured, happy, no need for follow-up. Just take your drug and you'll be normal.

Except normal wasn't exactly a word in her admittedly extensive vocabulary. She had never been normal, not compared to foster brothers and sisters, not to classmates, not to people in general. Foster parents were a little freaked out by her, a very young girl who could do advanced calculus problems in her heads. Some teachers were fascinated. For her social worker, it just made her harder to place.

This intelligence made her unprepared for society, because society doesn't like smart girls—Girls who intrude on male spaces. It made her alone, unable to connect with anyone. And that's why she thought she had gone insane: loneliness and grief.

These thoughts consumed Claudia as she lay there, listening to the sounds that the old Bed & Breakfast made; the creaks of the floorboards, the rushing of the wind on the windowpane. Her eyes were closed in a half-attempt at sleep, but her mind was too busy to shut down.

Finally, finally, she heard the front door open and close as quietly as possible, and two sets of shoes walked in. After a few minutes of unintelligible whispering, one person climbed up the steps and the door to Pete's room closed. Claudia waited, but even after fifteen minutes (she checked) Myka still had not made her way to bed. Curious, lonely, and unable to sleep, Claudia tiptoed out of her room in her green plaid pajama bottoms and black tank top. When she reached the bottom of the staircase, she spotted Myka sitting at the kitchen table, nibbling on some fruit and staring into space.

"Myka?" She asked softly, not wanting to scare her. The older woman turned around and smiled a little.

"Hey, Claude," she said. "Why are you up?"

"I couldn't sleep," Claudia replied, running a hand through her short red hair, suddenly a little embarrassed.

Myka nodded. "Me either. The last case hit a little close to home. Come sit."

Claudia obeyed, folding her legs under her on the wooden chair. Myka continued to eat her cantaloupe and strawberries snack.

"What made it hit close to home?" She asked after a few moments.

Myka shrugged. "The Artifact was making the girl who came across it crazy. She cried and screamed and tried to fight us off when we tried to take it from her—it was a pocket-watch that caused the wearer to believe that a cherished friend or family member had given it to them, but also, you know, drove them mad. Like, Ophelia mad."

"She tried to drown herself?" Claudia asked.

"I think she might have if we left it with her. Or figured out some other unpleasant end to her life." Myka looked at her companion and hesitated briefly, before continuing on. "She reminded me of you when we first met."

Claudia raised an eyebrow.

"We—Pete and I—thought you were an escaped mental patient out to kill Artie. When I first saw you, you were a crazed, pale, skinny kid with a nosebleed. And I know you better now, and that's not who you are, but that image has never left my mind. And I wonder how much a stay in a place like a psychiatric hospital has affected you." Myka spoke precisely but quickly. She was worried about the younger woman, who she sometimes heard cry out in her sleep.

Myka remembered the first night that had happened, a few weeks after Joshua had left for Switzerland and left his baby sister in South Dakota. She had been up, reading as per usual, while everyone else had gone to bed. It was about the time she would have marked her page and shut out the light when she heard a soft shout in the room beside hers. She waited a few minutes, listening, and when a similar noise came again, entered the girl's room and knelt next to her, placing a hand on her arm to jolt her awake. Claudia had been embarrassed and shy about it, but Myka remembered being 18 and in a new place and how she'd felt.

The redhead bit her lip and looked away. "It's not really something I know how to talk about," she said. "There was a lot that went on there. Is that really what's bothering you? Because it shouldn't. Myka, I'm fine now. I have you guys."

"You have us," Myka repeated. "Now, what's keeping you up?"

Claudia sighed, a little. "Can I just sit here a while?" She asked. "I don't want to talk right now."

The woman scrutinized her for a few moments, and then relented. "Okay," she said. "How about we watch some TV and go to bed, then."

Both women stood up and headed into the living room. As they walked, Myka threw a supportive arm around Claudia's shoulders and hugged her tight.


End file.
